Lesson 1

Introduction to Law

What is law?

- Law is a set of rules and principles

- In a democracy, laws govern the conduct of society
- Laws promote the goals of peace, order and good governance
- Laws should be in written form
- If laws are not written, there is a risk of unfairness in application
- The laws are adopted by the government (lawmakers)

Law & Justice

- Justice is a process of applying the law

- Law is a set of rules to maintain order and to provide fair treatment to all
- The law is enforced by the courts, by the judges
- Very important that the people respect the judges
- If we do not respect the judges, then we will not respect their decisions
- Justice has to be perceived by the public as having been rendered fairly

Law & Ethics

- Ethics are moral values, our personal views on what is right and wrong
- Ethical principles are not decided by government lawmakers
- Society’s ethical views on appropriate behavior and acceptable conduct changes over
time
- Changes in ethical beliefs help foster changes to the law
- Views are always changing and for this reason laws will change to reflect changes in
society’s views
- Laws are often slow to change since lawmakers must deal with conflicting ethical views
of their constituents
- Laws set out defined standards and are enforced by the courts (ex law sets the legal
minimum wage rate)
- Ethical principles on the other hand are subjective in nature and are not enforced by the
courts (ex ethics asks is the minimum wage rate fair)
Public, private, civil & common law

Private vs Public Law

Private law
- deals with the relationships between persons
Two specific areas:
1) Contractual responsibility: this deals with your obligations in a contractual situation
2) Non contractual responsibility/civil liability: this deals with your duty under the law not
to injure
Does not involve the government acting in its official capacity
- Private law does cover the actions of government where the government is acting in a
commercial capacity (ex government is an employer or is purchasing goods and services)
Breach of private law: compensation for bodily, moral, and material injury (damage).
Compensation simply puts you back in the position that you were in before the breach
occurred. So compensation looks at the actual and direct damage that you have suffered

Public law
- Deals with the relationship between the government acting in an official capacity and its
citizens
- Enforcement of citizens duties to the state, ex criminal law and income tax
- Breach of public law: punishment (punishment is to punish you for not respecting the
law and punishment is also to send out the message to other people to set an example
so that they will not breach public law)

Civil vs Common Law

Civil Law:
- Deals with matters under Quebec provincial jurisdiction
- Historically the laws of quebec were based on the private laws used in France prior to
the 1760s
- French law continued to apply after the colonies were ceded to Britain
- All general principles of law are collected and codified into one rule book known as the
civil code
- When faced with a legal question, lawyers and judges refer to:
First: civil code
Second: jurisprudence (previous court cases)

Common Law
- Deals with federal laws that have common application all across Canada, also applies in
all other Canadian provinces for matters under provincial jurisdiction
- Historically based on the British law system
- Under the British system general principles of law were not codified into a civil code
- When faced with a legal question, lawyers and judges refer to:
 First: jurisprudence (previous court cases) in order to determine how judges treated
similar situations in the past
Second: statues (law) would be examined

Substantive vs Adjectival (procedural) law

Substantive laws (look at this): sets out the specific rights and responsibilities that persons are
bound by. Example: civil code or the consumer protection act
Adjectival/procedural: rules set out to govern on how substantive laws should be applied
Example: code of civil procedures sets out the steps to take and the order to file documents
when instituting a lawsuit. Code of civil procedure sets out the steps to take in order to institute
a legal action when you’re suing somebody. There’s an order to file documents. There are time
delays that have to be respected.

Litigation

- Process of going to court

- Where one person sues another person
- You have 2 parties and you have a judge

- The formal procedure by which a person takes a court action against another person to
claim damages/recover a debt/enforce an obligation
- Litigation is also referred to as a lawsuit
- Creditor: the person to whom a debt is owed
- Debtor: the person who owes a debt/obligation to another
- Plaintiff: the person who initiates a lawsuit (litigation) against his/her debtor (usually
the creditor)
- Defendant: the person against whom the lawsuit is taken, person being sued (usually
debtor)

Class Action
- Where multiple persons have a similar claim against a common defendant, proof of one
person’s claim will be sufficient to prove the damages suffered by all plaintiffs
- Example: a class action might be taken by all purchases of a new automobile, brand X,
that has manufacturing defects in its brake system. The cost of repairing the defect in
each car is sufficiently similar to allow a judge to render a decision compensating a large
number of plaintiffs, without each plaintiff having to get their own garage estimate of
the repair costs and present this evidence to the judge
- Benefits of class actions:
1. Saves court time, one lawyer represents all of the Plaintiffs collectively
2. Saves legal costs to plaintiffs, facilitates access to court for those who may not
otherwise be able to afford a lawsuit on their own
Where to institute a lawsuit

General rule: the plaintiff (Creditor) sues the defendant (debtor) in the city in which the
defendant is domiciled

What if the plaintiff (Creditor) and defendant (debtor) live in different cities, provinces or
countries)?
If the lawsuit is based on breach of contract, then:
- The parties can stipulate in the contract which court (city) will be competent to hear the
case. This clause is called choice of venue (forum)
- The parties can stipulate in the contract which law will apply to govern the contract. This
clause is called choice of law. If you live in the province of Quebec and you’re entering
into a contract with somebody who lives in the state of Washington, which law will
apply? You want the laws of Quebec to apply. The other party wants the laws of the
state of Washington to apply. So in the contract, you can agree on either the law of
Quebec, the law of the state of Washington or you can choose a totally different law (ex
laws of Ontario)

Prescription
- After a certain lapse of time, from the date that the obligation was due or from the date
that the damage was caused, a creditor will not be permitted to take a lawsuit to
enforce his/her rights. Under common law this is referred to as a limitation period
- General rule under the civil code of Quebec for breach of contract and for non-
contractual liability: prescription three years or less

Federal and provincial authority

- In Canada, the power to pass laws is divided between the federal government and the
provincial governments
- Certain areas of law will fall under the federal government’s exclusive authority
- Certain areas of law will fall under the provincial government’s exclusive authority
- There are areas such as income tax, which are shared by the federal and provincial
authorities

Federal: includes
- Criminal
- Currency/banking
- Immigration
- Universities
- IT property
- These laws apply the same way all across Canada

Provincial: includes
- Property
- Ownership
 - Civil rights
- Contracts
- Employment law
- Non-contractual responsibility (civil responsibility)
- Family
- Commercial
-

Sources of laws
- Sources of law available to assist judges in rendering a decision
Statues: written laws adopted by the government (provincial & federal)
Jurisprudence (case law): court judgments, decisions rendered by judges interpreting
statues or making new law if the statues are silent
Doctrine: articles/essays written by legal experts analyzing particular areas of legal
concern, especially relevant in areas of law which are new and emerging. Example:
internet transactions (duties, responsibilities, jurisdiction), liability for defamation on
social media, cyber bullying
Custom and usage (tradition): commonly accepted historical practices used in a
particular community

Introduction to the Quebec Legal System

Quebec Court System

- Three distinct levels

First level: Trial Court (court of first instance)

- Two parties and a judge, trial, witnesses cross examination
- What you see on TV
- Divided into two specific courts:
1. Court of Quebec: where the judges are appointed by the Quebec government
2. Quebec Superior Court: where the judges are appointed by the federal government

Second level: Quebec Court of Appeal

- Decisions from both the court of Quebec and the Quebec Superior Court would go to
the Quebec court of appeal

Third level: Supreme Court of Canada

- Common final appellate court which hears appeals from all of the court of appeals from
all of the provinces and territories in Canada

Trial Court
 - All law suits will start at the Trial Court
- Also referred to as the Court of First Instance

Characteristics of the Trial Court

- Cases heard by one judge
- In Quebec, civil law court cases (not criminal) have no trial by jury, only by the judge
alone
- Plaintiff (taking the action) vs defendant (person being sued)
- Approximate 4 year time frame from the date the lawsuit is filed until the judgment is
rendered

Divisions of Authority between trial courts (2 trial courts)

Court of Quebec:
- Judges appointed by the provincial government
- Claims for an amount greater than $15,000 and less than $85,000

- Small Claims court: a branch of the court of Quebec. Claims for an amount of $15,000 or
less. Plaintiff must be an individual or a company with 10 or less employees
- There is no appeal, no lawyers, judge effectively acts as arbitrator

Quebec Superior Court:

- Judges appointed by the federal government
- Claims for an amount equal or greater than $85,000

Quebec Court of Appeal

- Will hear appeals from both the court of Quebec and from the Quebec superior court

Characteristics of the Quebec Court of Appeal

- Cases heard by three judges and decision are rendered by majority not by unanimity
- Appellant (the party who is appealing the Trial Court decision) vs Respondent (responds
to the appeal)
- Appellant will be the party who lost the case at trial and is not happy with the decision
- The appellant could be the original plaintiff or could be the defendant
- Approximate 3 year time frame from the date the Trial court rendered its judgment
- Appeals from both the court of Quebec and the Quebec Superior Court

Just because you’re not happy with the decision that was rendered by the Trial Court does not
automatically give you the right to appeal the Trial Court decision to the Quebec Court of
Appeal. Two factors to be looked at
- First factor – Grounds for appeal: trial court judge made a material error in interpreting
the facts or the law
- Second factor – Right to appeal:
 Automatic right of appeal where the object in dispute in the Trial Court is equal or
greater than $60,000 up to $85,000
With permission from the Quebec Court of Appeal when the object is less than $60,000
Supreme Court of Canada

- Highest court in the land

- No appeal beyond the supreme court of Canada
- Back in the day there used to be an appeal to the British House of Lords but that
disappeared 50 years ago
- Final court
- Any decision rendered by the supreme court of Canada stands as law
- No other court can challenge it
- Will hear appeals from all of the provincial courts of appeal from all the different
provinces

Characteristics of the Supreme Court of Canada

- Cases usually heard by all nine judges and decision rendered by majority not by
unanimity
- Appellant (the party who is appealing the Quebec Court of Appeal decision) vs
Respondent (person who responds to that appeal)
- Approximate three-year time frame from the date the Quebec Court of Appeal rendered
its judgment
- 4+3+3 = 10 years for case to work its way through the whole court system
- Special cases that the supreme court of Canada could render a decision quickly
- Hears the appeals from the courts of appeal of all provinces
- Grounds for appeal: trial judge or court of appeal judge made a material error in
interpreting the facts or the law
- Right to Appeal:
In all cases, only with permission from the Supreme Court of Canada (no automatic)
As a general rule, the supreme court of Canada will respect the decisions of the
provincial courts of appeal and refuse your request for permission to appeal
The supreme court of Canada may agree to hear a case where a new law, that the
supreme court of Canada has not ruled on before, is at issue
The supreme court of Canada may agree to hear cases involving issues of public order
and national importance and those dealing with potential charter of human rights
angements
The amount of money in dispute is not a relevant factor in deciding if the supreme court
of Canada will hear a case
They deal with human rights issues
Very few cases make it to the supreme court of Canada and genuinely they are cases of
significance and national importance